I am working on the Sociable Weaver Project. Annually, we capture the whole population of weavers in our study site (20km far from Kimberley, Northern Cape), which is about 20 colonies.

We would need one or two more extra person(s) to help us capturing the birds, ideally we would like to have people for a few days (a week or so) between the 30th of August and the 20th of September.

Transport (to get to Kimberley from SA), accommodation and food costs are covered.

We would prefer someone with experience in birds handling but beginners or non-experimented person are also welcome to contact us.

Typically, our work during that time involves to wake up before sunrise, set up mis-nets, removing birds from the net, ringing and collecting morphometrics (+ blood sample, pit-tag insertion, photos). It usually takes us a good part of the morning, sometimes until noon and then the afternoon are free. This is a good opportunity to learn how to catch birds and to manipulate them.

Please let us know if you are interested, I am leaving myself from Cape Town around the 28-29th of August and I can provide a lift.

Margaux Rat
PhD candidate, Percy FitzPatrick Institute, DST/NRF Centre of Excellence, University of Cape Town

Contact details here.

Sociable Weaver project.